Safety roundup
Risk areas your safety director should be thinking about.
Our three recommendations in July.
On average in the UK, July is the warmest month, making any risk area exacerbated by the heat one to watch. So top of the list this month is fatigue. We also feature both level crossing and road risk, as lives, including railway colleagues’, have been lost where road meets rail and in road traffic accidents.
The risk of fatigue is greater during the summer months. Put simply, hot weather makes people sleepy. Add to this other factors that cause tiredness – such as working conditions, shift patterns, and challenging demands, which are all common in our industry, it’s no wonder this is a risk area.
And fatigue isn’t to be taken lightly. After all, it’s been listed as a causal factor in several accidents, including Clapham in 1988. So RSSB, working with the Fatigue Coordination Group, is supporting the industry in reducing fatigue-related incidents. This work has seen us develop a resource-rich ‘hub’, packed with guidance and tools, which your safety director is bound to find useful.
Visit page
Last month the industry, worldwide, marked International Level Crossing Awareness Day, because intersections where the railway meets a road or footpath can be fatal. According to the latest Annual Health and Safety Report (AHSR), there were five fatalities at level crossings in 2022/23.
Lifestyle changes can increase the likeliness of these incidents. A correlation between increases in dog ownership and level crossing risk has been identified in the AHSR. But the industry can take steps to improve safety in this area. Share our Level Crossings Digest and Level Crossing Risk Management Toolkit with your colleagues so they can consider potential improvements.
This is a number you may be familiar with: in the decade to 2019, 10 of the 20 work-related fatalities were caused by road traffic accidents. Subsequently, such accidents emerged as the largest contributor to workforce deaths in the industry. Fast-forward to 2022/23 and there were two fatalities caused by work-related road traffic collisions.
Therefore, road risk is a risk area that industry should keep a close eye on. We’re keen to support industry reduce these incidents. The Road Traffic Collision Investigation Toolkit will help ensure investigations get to the root causes of each collision. Tell your colleagues about it, because by understanding the cause, we can get better at prevention. Visit page
